Viva Las Legas!

Kristin and I ran the Las Vegas marathon last weekend, after many months of training... Wow, look at our time, 2 Hours, 3 min. A womens world record. We have been working hard!

Of course the weekend was filled with obnoxiousness and weirdos- Adam and I and Kristin and her husband Matt being some of the weirdos! The race was so quintessentially Las Vegas. Literally one of the Aid stations was a run through wedding chapel. We saw lots of runners that were brides, wearing veils. It was hilarious. One maid of honor was wearing a short hot pink satin dress. We spent the whole race gawking at people. The race was also trying to get the world record for the most running "ELVI" in a marathon. Literally there were tens of thousands. More than 55,000 people ran total. There were so many Elvis'. It was so fun to see everyone dressed up in costumes. Everyone was yelling "go Elvis!" the whole race.

Of course, we had to try it out a little.... It was a rock and roll marathon right? They had big bands about every 2 miles playing loud, fun music. I loved it!

Adam and I decided to try out the Elvis look too. Do you like me with a mustache? I think it's pretty hot. These are my new favorite sunglasses.

Well. even with all the silliness, race morning came. We were nervous, but felt ready. Our last long run had been 22 miles, and we had felt great that whole run. We were ready to go!

Can you imagine the logistics of that many people running, It was crazy. There were helicopters everywhere. They had a HUGE starting line and we were off and running! It was so so cool to run down the middle of the Strip. It gets shut down once a year for this race only. I'm sure the casino owners go nuts, but it was so cool to see it. The Mirage had the fire and water show going off as we ran by. There were hilarious drunks standing outside the bars trying to hand out cups of beer to the runners. Some of the brides were crying as they kissed their new husbands and then kept running! They had two Elvises be the witnesses to every wedding. We ran 6 1/2 miles down the strip, then came back up the other side. It went by so fast because of all the cool things to look at. We saw the husbands several times. They scrambled and made it to about 7 different points of the race. They seemed to be everywhere. It was great.
This was the half way point. The half-marathoners were finishing, and really, we were just beginning! That second half was really brutal. K's mom and dad were there cheering too- it was great, but K was struggling, and cried when we saw them. She was feeling alot of pain. I was feeling really achy all over, especially my left knee and ankle, but hey- it's a marathon, it's supposed to hurt! At one point we were running right along with one of the free pacers in the race. I really wanted to keep up with him, and finish in the 4th hour, but Kristin couldn't. I didn't want to leave her, and thank goodness I didn't because my ankle inj might have been much worse. At mile 23 I wished I was dead. We didn't really stop too much, it hurt to get started again. My legs felt like they weighed 200 pounds each. At this point my ankle and knee were screaming. But we had prepared for this. I kept telling myself. "Its ok that it hurts. 45 more minutes of pain and it will all be over. All you have to do is keep running and it will be over sooner." As we neared to finish line, I felt so relieved, and even tried to pass up a few last people.

We did it! I was so glad it was over and we had finished. We did it in 5:20. A very slow time, but you know, I don't run fast. I run to accomplish my goals and to have a good time, and 5:20 still counts! Adam had the best sign I saw the whole time. He is the best cheerleader. I think he likes supporting as much as I like running. He is the BEST.

I'm not kidding when I say I've worn that medal at least once a day since! ha ha!!! Adam secretly even took it to work one day this week to show it off. How sweet is that?

Right after the race, I layed down on the hotel bed and slept- in my sick, sweaty clothes, I have NEVER done that. I thought it was weird. When I woke up and showered, I couldn't bend my ankle enough to get out of the shower, I just felt in pain and terrible. We walked to a local Denny's for dinner, thinking it would be good to get myself moving and eating. Boy, that wasn't the best option i learned later! That night I fell asleep and 2 hours later was so uncomfortable I felt like I couldn't hold still. EVERYTHING hurt. It was the worst night. When I woke up the next morning, my ankle was swollen huge, up into my calf and down into my foot. It was starting to get black and blue. This was when I realized that something was wrong, and not just feeling tired and sore. We drove home to SL. I saw my sports medicine dr on Tuesday morning, and my ankle is broken, I broke it across the tibia, and the outside ankle bone, I also have a raging case of tendonitis that makes it hard to move my foot at all. So, I got a boot, crutches, prednisone, loratab. and resting instructions. Luckily its sports medicine, so they are treating really aggressively and I think I might be off the crutches as early as next week. Boy are they a pain. Have you ever tried to Christmas shop or clean house with crutches? It's pointless!

But, as you can see. those little medals will make you do crazy things! I'm so glad we ran the Vegas marathon. It was super fun and now I've run 3 marathons!